


where everything human [has been betrayed]

by theonlytwin



Series: now that you are dead [2]
Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Hey blizzard u took too long sombra is mine now, M/M, PTSD, Sad shit happens, Slow Burn, Suicidal Thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-05
Updated: 2016-11-09
Packaged: 2018-08-29 04:40:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 10,793
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8475790
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theonlytwin/pseuds/theonlytwin
Summary: Six months after he died, Reaper picked his name. (Reaper is obsessed with death for a good reason. Probably Sombra has a good reason too, but she's not sharing.)





	1. accompanied by parching madnesses

**Author's Note:**

> spanish translations in the alt text! this is a sequel, read the first part if you're confused.

The problem with trusting someone like Sombra for your intel is when her plans don’t line up with your plans you’ve got nowhere to turn, because she can tweak every single other source of intel until it agrees with her. 

 

This is how he ends up in Overwatch custody as soon as Sombra decides he’s a liability. 

 

He walked right into an ambush. Lena Oxton, time traveller, and Winston no-last-name-because-he’s-a goddamn-gorilla, scientist, get the drop on him. 

 

He gets shot, shocked, boxed in an electrified cage, loses solid form, then consciousness. 

 

***

 

Ziegler injects him, over and over and over - or maybe just a few times, but the electrocutions they’ve been using to keep him secured have messed with his memory a little. A lot. 

 

 _Mercy,_ he whispers. 

 

_You will be well soon, Gabriel._

 

She’s always been so bad with nuance.

 

***

After Zurich, there had been - a bed, and gunfire - a lot. He had dissolved - and then -

  
***

 

Now there’s a bed, no gunfire. No noise but the heart rate machine.

 

***

Six months after he died, Reaper picked his name. 

He suspected who he was as soon as he slid, tortuously, from gas to solid and back again, confirmed it when he stood over a guard with a broken neck and swallowed his fucking soul. That’s what it felt like. He healed over three bullet holes with someone else’s death.

He’s not - all there, still. Ever. There are - gaps. In him. Missing flesh. Sometimes he can see his organs. Sometimes he can’t see. New patches of skin are pale, initially, hairless, but they build back the same old scars. 

He has been sacrificed. He has been stripped of his skin. He has been broken and remade. He is la flor de muerte, the keeper of bones. He is Mictecacihuatl born again. 

But anyone who knows how to pronounce it will know Mictecacihuatl is meant to be a woman, so he goes by Reaper. 

***

 

It’s a closed system, he’s in. His bed, a table, two chairs, a bathroom running on a recycle tank. The double doors with an airlock in between, in case he dissolves into smoke again. He can’t, he’s checked. 

 

A cell where air is passed in and out through an electrified filter. They had prepared this for him, he realises. 

 

***

He lost four months, between Zurich and figuring himself out proper. 

He can’t remember what he was doing. He can’t remember - 

He remembers it was Northman who found him, shaking and smoking, skin seething on the ground, mile and a half from some husked corpses, not too far from the Cameroon Watchpoint. 

She doesn’t look surprised - but then, she never did. 

_You got to get it together, cap. Stay frosty._ She grabs his arm, which dissipates. _You wanna go out like this?_

He’s not sure if he can go out at all, but he knows he doesn’t wants to go back - so he drags himself together, and she grabs his arm again, pulls him to his feet. He has feet.

_I got a safehouse, cap. C’mon._

***

In the safehouse, there’s seven computers piled on top of each other, two air conditioners running, and no food. He isn’t hungry. 

The kid is there - maybe sixteen now, unshowered, squinting at a screen, hunched. Shaved head, bright lines running along her skull. There’s a spinal implant glowing through the back of her shirt, purple star bursts on her leggings, no shoes. 

_Levántate,_ Northman tells her. _Company._

She spins on her chair, looks at him - he knows there are gaps in his face, in his chest under the jacket Northman stole for him. 

_Soy Sombra._ I know what you are. 

The keeper of bones, he thinks. La flor de muerte.

_What am I?_

_Nanite utility fog. Something’s obviously gone wrong in the programming, but since the process a) is experimental, b) got interrupted and c) is meant to be done on someone injured but alive, el hecho de que estás caminando y hablando es casi un milagro._

Miracle just means someone has plans for him. _Explain utility fog to me,_ he says. 

She spins back to her screens. _ Quizás. If you agree to help._

_Help what?_

She flicks folders open, maps, reports, videos, photos, splays them across the screens. _Uncover it. The UN. Overwatch, Blackwatch, Talon. Figure out the truth. Tell everyone._

He looks at Northman, who nods, once. 

_Por supuesto._

Sombra grins at Northman.


	2. like a speck in the void, pacing to and fro

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He dreams of Orange County as it was, under a haze of smog.

Northman still calls him cap. He calls her Idaho. They both take orders from Sombra, who calls them señor and señorita, talks fast and flat, thinking outloud. 

_Is this the chain of command?_ he asks, on the second day. Northman nods. _You got anyone else?_

Sombra shakes her head. _Señorita doesn’t like new people._

_Small team, no room for bad faith,_ Northman says. 

_Good,_ he replies. 

***

Over the next months, they gather intel. 

He and Northman move silently, leaving no trace, through offices and factories and old Watchpoints. 

Sombra sits at a computer, feeding them instructions, humming terrible pop songs, telling them how to get through firewalls and camera sweeps. 

After, they sort through data, put places and names and dates together, next to things Reaper remembers, rumours Northman heard, secrets Sombra’s uncovered. 

She lays out their next steps clearly, has an ever changing five year plan for how they’ll get what they need, how they’ll release it. 

It’s slow work, but satisfying, in the way of a job well done. They are invisible, and see everything. 

They travel light. Sombra has heavy duty computers, weapons, ammunition and an aluminium coffee maker waiting in every safehouse, which she rents and stocks, as far as he can tell, through money skimmed off of big budget transactions, stored in shell corporations. 

_How’d you get into this?_ he asks her, once. 

_I’m Batman,_ she says. _But better because Batman didn’t get his shit together until he was like thirty, and I outsourced the punching, because I’m smart._

_Eat your soup,_ says Northman. _Batman didn’t die of malnutrition._

_Si, senorita,_ she eats her soup, staring at Reaper. _I’d like to be able to absorb necessary energy from the atmosphere, like you. Be able to photosynthesise._

He doesn’t have to eat, or excrete, so he’s just stopped. No point in pretending. 

_Can’t always get what you want,_ he tells her. 

***

Later, he asks Northman. 

_How’d you find her?_

_She found me. I was in Mexico. Got a message someone wanted to trade info for service. She was running with Los Muertos. Did a couple jobs. Didn’t find out how young she was for six or seven months, when she wanted to go international._

_You teamed up with a ten year old?_

Northman shrugs. _Smartest ten year old I ever met. Besides, working alone gets you killed as fast as working with a bad team._

He nods. _Learned that the hard way._

She looks at him. _How long you gonna keep making jokes about how you died?_

_When they stop being funny._

_They were never funny._

_I’m smiling,_ he says, and there’s a hole in his cheek that he knows makes the smile something awful. 

***

He gets shot again, absorbing a bullet meant for Northman, and because there’s no recent kills around, finds out that his body will push bullets out of itself, given enough time. 

He experiments - cuts his arm, swallows acid - he always gets better, but it’s faster if he absorbs - Sombra says it’s potential energy that would have otherwise be released through decomposition - a soul. 

_Los animales probablemente trabajarían. Carne. The bigger the mass, the more energy. But you seem to eventually gather it anyway, from light and heat, so I guess it’s only necessary in emergencies._

_In an emergency where I’m fatally wounded but there’s a big, convenient, recently butchered piece of steak around._

_Yes, obviously it’s going to be people you’ve killed,_ she says, matter of fact. _He leído tus archivos, señor._

_What files?_

She laughs. 

***

He does still need to sleep, it seems. He does dream. 

He dreams of Orange County as it was, under a haze of smog. 

He dreams Catrina’s hands, Emiliano’s wasted legs. 

Ana and Fareeha’s eyes. 

Alec, Alondra, Arda, Emmaline, Frank, Gabrielle, Ian, Malia, Nelson, Nick, Priyanka, Sonam, Zhi. 

He dreams of owls, and blood, and Jack.

***

 

He wakes in his bed feeling more like a human than he has in years. No pieces missing. Tired. Hungry. 

 

Fareeha stands over him. _Of all my parental figures who faked their own death,_ she says, _yours was the least surprising._

 

He smiles, and feels his new skin stretch. _I wasn’t faking._

 

 _So Mercy tells us,_ says Jesse. He’s at the foot of the bed, looking old and mean. _Seem alright, for a dead man._

 

He looks up at Fareeha. He’s only seen her in armour, since he died. Here she is in civvies, still intimidating. _You got tall,_ he says.

 

 _You got stupid,_ she replies, without rancour.

 

He nods. _Got angrier. Being angry makes you stupid._

 

 _That’s a nifty catch phrase,_ says Jesse. _Coulda said that instead of shooting us._

 

 _How often did I hit?_ He shifts a little in his bed. _I dropped a light fixture on Winston when I had a clear headshot. I clipped your goddamn sombrero often enough you shoulda bought a new one by now. Didn’t let anyone I liked get hurt too bad without Mercy around._

 

 _You killed thirty seven Overwatch agents,_ Fareeha says.

 

He can see their faces. He knows their names. He holds every one of them inside himself. 

 

 _Talon traitors. I got evidence._

 

 _You worked for Talon,_ Jesse says.

 

_As a contractor. After the fall. To get the evidence._

 

 _Talon’s full of Blackwatch, I’m pretty sure,_ says Jesse. _I’ve killed a few myself._

 

_None left. That last push - shoulda cleared them._

 

_You expect us to thank you?_

 

 _I expected to die._ He closes his eyes, opens them. _I didn’t expect anyone to come get me. Didn't ask anyone to do this._

 

Fareeha folds her arms. _My mother says there’s hope for you._

 

He laughs. The air rushes in and out of his lungs. He passes out.

 

***

Nearly a year after he died, Sombra comes up with a new plan. 

_Working for Talon?_ Northman says. _They know our faces._

_They know yours and his,_ says Sombra. _But he’s dead, and I don’t have a reputation, yet._

_My face isn’t fit for public anyway._ When he goes out, it’s under a hood, a scarf, sunglasses, a ski mask. _Be a good way to get info,_ he admits. _Infiltrate them, see how they like it._

_Could use their personnel,_ says Northman, _and not have to worry about bad faith, because we know their bad fucking faith._

_I’ll need a disguise,_ he says. _And you need to stay behind the scenes._

Sombra considers this. _For a while longer, yes. But one of you should teach me to fight too._

Northman and Reaper look at each other. 

***

The mask is spun carbon. The coat is graphene silk. He can make these things now, from himself. From the air around him. He is his own 3D printer, his own gunsmith. 

Northman stares at him. She folds her arms, circles him. 

_It’s meant to strike fear,_ he says. 

_You look like a parade skeleton,_ says Sombra. _A supervillain. Es bueno._

***

 _Don’t like you going in alone,_ Northman says. 

_Won’t be alone,_ he tells her. _Got our fearless leader in my ear. And you don’t want to leave her alone. She’ll try and live off of potatoes and coffee._

Sombra’s spraying his mask with a tracking gel, covering the coded micro-transceiver matrix she bonded to it. He can make his body and shoes and shotguns without thinking, by now, but building a working piece of electronics is beyond him. Shoulda picked up engineering when he had the chance. 

She looks up, says, _Potatoes are a complete protein, if you eat enough of them._

_Yeah, I’ll be here,_ says Northman. _Watch your back._

_What’s the worst that’ll happen? I die?_ He grins, and Sombra laughs as she hands him the mask. 

Northman shakes her head, minutely.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> caitlin northman: done with these shitty goths


	3. black, unastonishable, powerfully

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Northman’s been teaching her something between parkour and krav maga. She’s finally started wearing shoes - weird minimalist toe shoes that she uses to grip onto walls, but shoes at least.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tw for eye trauma in this chap - just a little, leave me a comment if you want to know how to avoid it!

Talon like Reaper. Talon like supervillains.

***

He spends weeks, months, in the field at a time. Makes his way back to Northman and Sombra slowly, so he can’t be tracked. 

Whenever he comes back to them, they swap new information, Sombra outlines the updates to the plan, and then he and her spar. 

Northman’s been teaching her something between parkour and krav maga. She’s finally started wearing shoes - weird minimalist toe shoes that she uses to grip onto walls, but shoes at least. 

She gets better every time he sees her, though in combat she’s a little mechanical, hesitant. 

_No killer instinct,_ Northman had said. _Or - it’s there, but she’s gotten too good at second guessing it. Too much in her head._

Fourteen months after he died, he sits her down. 

_You’ve been training with Idaho, who you don’t want to hurt, and I get it. But you need to step it up. In a real fight, you don’t know your opponent, what they’re capable of. You aim at incapacitation, but sometimes it’s kill or be killed._ He cracks his neck. _I want you to kill me._

_Actually kill you? Because in your current state -_

_As if I was a regular person who’s not going to get better from a broken neck in a half hour._

_You want me to break your neck?_

_Or otherwise eliminate me. Kill me. You need the practice._

She nods, slowly. _You’re not a standard opponent._

_There’s no such thing._ He drops his weight onto the balls of his feet. _Just win, baby._

He hadn’t meant to call her that, but she had reminded him, for a moment, of Fareeha. They’re not actually alike, apart from being smart girls born into a bad world, but something about skinny adolescent limbs settling into a combat stance reminded him. He wonders if she’s joined the army, like she planned to. Sombra could probably find out for him. 

He thinks this as she attacks him, faster than last time. She does go for his throat, which he blocks, and then his solar plexus, and his knees, his throat again - she’s going for him. 

She’s still the weaker fighter, of course, but she’s not predictable. 

He thinks this very clearly as she swings a tiny screwdriver into his eye socket. It doesn’t pierce his skull, but it does lodge in the meat of his eye. 

It is enormously painful. 

_You always carry this?_ he mutters, feeling the jelly run down his face, the nanite smoke start sliding around the intrusion. 

_Yes,_ she says, and headbuts the handle. 

*** 

When he wakes up, she’s sitting over him, just watching. The screwdriver is on her knee. 

_I don’t want to hurt you, either. I meant for that to be quicker._

_Appreciate it._ He tilts his head - Northman is here too, back from whatever errand she was on. _Found her killer instinct._

_Congratulations,_ she says, dry. 

_You should teach me to shoot, next._

Northman nods.

***

 

 _You have been substantially stabilised,_ says Ziegler. _No more constant regeneration. No more spontaneous atomic construction. I have suppressed the sublimation, though that may return. You will start aging again._

 

_Can I die?_

 

She inclines her head. _Not of an injury. You will still, I believe, heal wounds and misadventures, but of the natural course, in twenty or thirty years, yes. You will die._

 

That’s what Santa Muerte is revered for, he supposes. A natural death, not a violent one. 

 

He can accept that.

 

Ziegler may be waiting for thanks.

 

He can’t quite do it. _You gonna let me outta here?_

 

_When you are stronger._

 

He doesn’t believe her.

***

Wilhelm visits while he’s doing ghetto physio - standing and sitting from his chair, slowly, trying to teach his legs how to balance again. 

 

_You have been missed, Gabriel._

 

_That why you built a cage for me?_

 

He shakes his huge head. _A safe place for a sick man. There are many who want you dead._

 

It’s true. It doesn’t make the airlock any less oppressive. _Bet some of them are in this building._

 

Wilhelm shakes his head again. _We will not let anyone extract supposed justice from you. Not after going to all the effort to get you back._

 

_Who’s idea was this, anyway?_

 

_I believe Mercy and Winston had the notion some months ago. This room was constructed while you were still - ah - smoke. In a box._

 

He has no memory of this. _How the fuck long was I smoke in a box?_

 

_A few days. And then you were treated for about a fortnight. And have been conscious and visibly human for a day._

 

Sombra’s been alone almost a month. _What’s next? Do I get a trial?_

 

 _Overwatch is changed. Old soldiers, new. Mercenaries, scientists, children. Omnics. We are all outlaws now, of one kind or another._ He stares at Wilhelm, who he remembers pounding tables and shouting about valour, honour, loyalty. Wilhelm sighs. _I do not know what will happen next. I simply wanted to tell you - you were missed. I am glad to see you again._ He stands, slowly. _Though I cannot promise the same of everyone._

***

Sombra angles a screen towards him, flicks through four or five blurry stills. _This one’s been stealing Overwatch property - incapacitating and collecting, haven’t figured out why yet. Know him?_

Jack Morrison in a mask is a weird sight - he never even wore one at Halloween, just lazy goddamn jumpsuits ordered the night before and sometimes make-up Ziegler did for him. 

Reaper had thought he was dead. He had believed that Jack Morrison was dead, because if Jack wasn’t dead, then he’d have come for - he’d have - after everything, Jack would - 

But he hadn’t, and Reaper had assumed he must be dead. 

He had mourned this stupid contrary fuck who’s wearing a face mask like that disguises his hair, his skull, his shoulders, the way he holds a weapon - it’s so painfully obvious who he is Reaper wonders if there’s some kind of joke here, if this is a long form prank. 

Northman leans over his shoulder. _Who is it?_

Maybe it’s less obvious to someone who hasn’t been watching him, thinking about him for twenty-something years. 

_That,_ Reaper taps the screen, zooming in, _is former Strike Commander of Overwatch and dead man Jack Morrison._

Northman looks at him, and back at the screen. _Is he trying to strike fear? Looks like a NASCAR driver._

_Strike Commander? The guy on all the posters?_ Sombra asks. Reaper nods. _Should we recruit him?_

_No,_ says Reaper, instinctively. 

Sombra looks at Northman, who says, _He was in charge of Overwatch and either didn’t notice or didn’t care about the shit going on under him._

_Lo vigilaré,_ Sombra tilts the screen back toward herself. 

Reaper wants to kill him, but that would probably be bad for the plan.

***

The plan currently, and deeply satisfyingly, involves killing off traitors. 

People who they know worked actively against Overwatch’s mission of protecting, supporting, developing. People who made money, who did favours, who lied. 

Their deaths serve as an assurance that they will not weasel their way out of punishment later, and also as a warning: do not do this. Do not consider doing this. 

But unless there’s some deeper, more insane level of conspiracy that they’ve not yet scraped, which is a very small possibility, Jack Morrison was never complicit. 

Everything they’ve revealed indicates what Reaper already knew: he was myopic, idealistic, self-centered, self-sacrificing. 

Was - is, maybe. 

If he kills Jack Morrison, it will be in combat. It will be how it should have been. 

Reaper will not seek him out. Reaper has patience. Reaper will wait.

***

Ana Amari sits opposite him, at the table in his room with no ventilation. _Where is your evidence?_

_Fareeha said you had hope for me. You on Jack’s side now?_

She shakes her head. _I was never on Jack’s side, Gabriel. I was always on mine. Besides, Jack’s not making many decisions these days._

That’s a surprise. _What’s he doing?_

_Alttaebis - I forget the English. Sadding? Despairing? Sulking. Regretting. Something like that._

He considers this a while. _Who’s in charge?_

_Winston, mostly._

He nods. _Makes sense. Most optimistic mammal I’ve ever met._

_He believes you may be redeemed - as do I. If you can prove what you’ve been saying._

_What does redemption look like?_ He shows his teeth. _Fix me up, give me a job? Put me back to work?_

Amari sits still. Still as a sniper. _At the moment it looks like the outside of this room. I’ll get back to you on everything else. If you tell me about your evidence._

He sighs. Outside of this room does sound nice. 

_Sombra._

_Sombra? The hacker? A lot of people are trying to find them. They’re meant to be a ghost._

_You and me are ghosts. She’s a pain in the ass who likes shitty music and a one to one sugar to coffee ratio. Hums too much._

_She works for you?_ Amari leans forward. 

_She doesn’t work for anyone. We had common goals._

***

The first November with Sombra and Northman sneaks up on him. He had been wading through intel about Vishkar and thinking about the fact that Amelie Lacroix now works for Talon, is blue, and goes on missions in something that looks even more like comic book rip off than his get up. 

So it’s a surprise to notice the time of year. 

November first, they’re in Bangladesh, and Sombra makes a shrine. 

She’s found marigolds, candles, incense, though it smells wrong. 

She puts down two cups of coffee, a twist of purple ribbon, some local candy. She bows her head and prays, silently. 

She does this in the same room where they eat, where her computers are. 

Northman lowers her head too, hands knotted together. 

Reaper can’t breathe. He doesn’t know if he has to breathe anymore, but he can’t right now, so he ghosts away, out of the room, up onto the roof, lies there, under a half moon, gasping for a while. 

Eventually, Sombra climbs out a window, vaults onto the roof, peers at him. 

_Pasas casi todo tu tiempo usando una calavera, y no te gusta el Día de los Muertos?_

_Used to. Entonces morí._

She nods. _Lost your faith._ He’s not sure how to begin to correct her. _I don’t really believe in all of it,_ she says, calm. _It’s just what you do. To think about the people you lost. Give yourself time to remember them. Hope that Santa Muerte is taking care of them, when you know they’re just - gone._

She doesn’t believe. 

He hasn’t heard anyone else say her name out loud since - since his abuelito died - and she doesn’t even believe. 

His existence, to Sombra, is a convenient accident she could incorporate into her five year plan, not believing that there might be a bigger fucking plan. 

She’s seventeen maybe, lives with two assassins, is offering coffee to the dead parents she doesn’t believe will notice, and she’s trying to make him feel better. 

It’s almost funny. 

_Vuelve abajo. Creo que la señorita agradecería tener alguien con quien hablar. I’m no good at listening. _

_We’re no good at talking,_ he tells her. 

She nods again, and clambers back down off the roof. 

He offers up an apology to Santa Muerte, though he knows she’s had worse. 

He descends, and listens as Northman awkwardly tells a story about Alondra Awray and some flat pack furniture. 

Reaper tells one about her too, about the time she tried to convince him that she had a special bond with a gator back home called Stumpy. 

Sombra doesn’t talk about anyone.

***

Now every time they spar, he asks Sombra to kill him. 

She doesn’t always pull it off - he knows about the screwdriver now. Sometimes he marks her, and they start again, and sometimes she only wounds him, and he keeps coming. 

She sits with him, every time, until he opens his eyes again. It’s a wake, essentially. 

He thinks of it that way until one time he comes to and she’s painting his nails. 

His hand is propped on her knee, her fingers interwoven with his, and she’s humming as she dips the brush back in the bottle, glances at him, where he blinks on the floor. 

_It’s your colour,_ she says, _black._

He hasn’t worn nail polish in - thirty-five years? Painting his middle finger silver and the rest black, so he was always flipping someone off. 

He hasn’t had his hand held in - an amount of time. 

Northman walks in with two bowls of something steaming. _Suits you,_ she says, as she holds one out to Sombra. 

He pulls his hand toward himself, looks at her work as she accepts the food. 

_You got any metallics?_ he asks.

***

_How do you get in touch with Sombra?_

 

_She gets in touch with you._

 

Amari raises an eyebrow. _Will she not want to help you? Give you the exonerating evidence?_

 

_It’s not about me. I’m not helpful to her any more. But unless something’s gone real wrong, she’s going to leak a lot of info soon, and I don’t think her goal is exoneration._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i made a mix, which is all weird experimental trip hop and jazz, but at least there's no songs by white guys on there: 8tracks.com/wehaveallgotknives/signed-blues-from-down-here


	4. fearlessly, patiently, unfortunately, against myself

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> We need to start building my brand.

His first actual contact with ex-Overwatch he isn’t planning to kill is in Gibraltar. 

He and Sombra figure out in advance how to make it look to Talon like their mission failed. She mocks up an Athena voice. They’ll get agent lists, Talon’ll get some beat up flunkies, Winston will get his first piece of entertainment in years. 

Trick with Winston in combat was always to piss him off, make him indestructible and stand back. It’s like being in high school and trying to start a fight. Posture. Pick the most obvious insult. Hit in a way that won’t get you both suspended. It’s all good if no one is bloodied. 

It turns out riskier, with more fucking slapstick than he had expected. 

***

Him getting electrocuted was not ideal - it fried his comms, so he can’t get in touch with Sombra. 

After he’s reformed and reported to Talon, he travels, without resting, for days, to their current base, in one of the Palestinian parts of Lebanon. 

_Did you know about the recall?_ is the first thing she says. 

_The what?_

_All Overwatch agents were recalled to active service. From Gibraltar. Almost immediately after we lost contact._

That’s not - entirely unexpected. Everyone who’s paying attention has heard the rumours of the new Omnic uprising. 

But Winston had thought - he must have been - Reaper starts laughing. 

Sombra frowns. 

Northman slaps him upside the head. _¿Qué?_ She only uses Spanish to issue instructions or demands. 

_I started this fucking thing._ He swallows the laugh. _I was there when it died. And now - I brought it back to life. By accident._ He raises his hands, as though in blessing. _Mi hijo bastardo._

_Duerme un poco,_ says Sombra. _We’ll talk when you’re saner._

He laughs some more at that, and collapses into a camp bed. 

***

_We need to start building my brand._

_Your brand?_

_Just call me Frederick H. Coca Cola._ He looks at Northman, who shrugs. _I want people to be afraid of me. It’ll save time. I can fuck shit up and sign my name - but you need to start telling people how scary I am._

She’s using a stylus to hold her hair up, and her shirt is covered in food stains, and she’s wearing those weird shoes. _Real scary._

_She does murder you once a month,_ says Northman. 

_Once every two or three._

_In another year or so, I’ll do my first big infodump - I’m thinking Lumerico, hometurf. By then I’ll be intimidating, and after that,_ she waves a hand, _ confianza._

_People will listen when you start talking about Overwatch,_ nods Reaper. _Building the brand._

***

He steals things and kills people for Talon, runs ops for Talon, sabotages one in ten of them, shuffles collateral and ammunition to hide his tracks. 

He kills ex-Overwatch, ex-Blackwatch agents - quick, clean, neat. 

He spreads chatter about Sombra, Sombra the hacker, Sombra the all knowing, Sombra the threat. Talon’s comms get jammed for 12 hours after someone asks Reaper if Sombra even exists. She makes turrets dance in their sockets, hides devastating data trawls under shitty pranks. 

He comes back to Northman and Sombra, spars, talks, puts pixelated photo next to unpublished article next to censored report, gets killed, gets his nails did. 

He observes Dia de los Muertos again, and tells the story of his mother’s thirty first birthday party, with the home karaoke. 

***

In Hokkaido, between missions, Northman knits them both sweaters. 

_Black,_ says Sombra. _How did you know?_

They are, he realises as he’s cleaning the coffee pot, the closest thing he’ll ever get to a nuclear family. 

***

Six months after Gibraltar is Egypt, which becomes its own form of slapstick. 

There’s a ghost who has Talon’s man in Cairo chasing his ass. 

Reaper suspects Ana Amari. Maybe it’s because he missed her funeral, maybe it’s some uncharacteristic optimism, but he’s never bought her death. Never felt it. 

Now someone who leaves no tracks is fucking up Talon in Ana Amari’s home town. 

He sets a trap, waits, and who should come blundering gun first into it but Jack chingado Morrison, looking like a NASCAR driver. 

Last time they were both in Cairo, they had fucked in a hotel room and then visited Fareeha with McCree. 

Now he’s storming the fort with a pulse rifle and a bad attitude, and Reaper has advantage. 

He could shoot him in the back of the head, and be done with it. Finish the fucking story - that’s the smart thing, probably. 

Instead, he shoots him in an unnecessarily painful way, and says exactly what he knows will fuck Jack up, will feed into his guilt. It’s messy, dangerous and stupid. 

Jack Morrison has always made him stupid. 

And Ana Amari, back from the dead, has always taken Jack’s side. 

She snatches his mask away, sees his face - his gaping, smoking face - and it’s all he can do to slide away, leaving her with a seed of doubt. 

It’s a mess. 

***

_We could have recruited him,_ says Sombra. _Both of them, they’re assets._

_They’re working with Overwatch again,_ says Northman. 

Sombra is watching him. _They know you, though._

_That was a long time ago._

Morrison came in gun first. Amari’s been hiding from her daughter for a decade. Reaper doesn’t know those people. *** 

In DC, he works with Widowmaker for the first time, trying to collect Doomfist’s gauntlet. 

Sombra privately tips off Winston, Reaper fails to shoot him, Widowmaker cusses him out during the whole ride back to Talon. 

She gives no indication of recognising him, his voice, like Jack did, but there’s no reason for her to admit it, even if she remembers Gabriel Reyes. 

None of them are what they were. 

***

Three years after he dies, he starts firing at an aerial assault vehicle before he realises it’s a person in a suit. 

Sombra hacks their chatter, and he realises it’s Fareeha Amari in a suit. 

She blows him up. 

It takes him longer than usual to reform - twice as long - which he puts down to shock. 

***

Jesse fucking McCree, still dressing like a cowboy, shoots him in the knees in Lahore. 

*** 

_I don’t want to get close to Overwatch people I’m not about to kill,_ he says, after that. 

_If Morrison’s working with them, we have to assume they all know who you are. I thought you were prepared for that._

_They don’t know who I am. They knew me, they left me, and then I fucking died. No quiero hablar de mierda de nuestra historia mientras alguien está tratando de matarme. Again!_

She tips her head, nods. 

***

Amari says, _Even if there’s evidence - what gives you the right to kill our team members? Our family members?_

 

He shakes his head. _You got it turned around. We were meant to be a team first, then family. Family member fucks up, you forgive them. The team fucks up, you gotta fix it._

 

_But to kill them? To execute them, with no trial? What gives you the right?_ He can’t tell if this is still an interrogation, or if she’s just curious. But he has, quite literally, nothing to lose.

 

_Because I started this team. History books might forget me - history books are real fond of forgetting people like me. But Overwatch was my responsibility for years. I gave half my life to this team. My death, too. The things I gave - the things I gave up._

 

He swallows. _Good people - better people than me and you - gave their lives for this team. Gave everything. To do good. To make a positive change._ He keeps his voice flat, as flat as he can. _People I killed, executed - Vicki Yotch, Ryu Kurino, Tim Sarvaas, Yonaton Lopez, Mo Hua, Elspeth Schurman, Eka Kahn, Robert Tierney, that happy fucker, Tierney, remember him? Brewing his own beer, back in the beginning?_

 

His voice isn’t flat any more. He runs his hand over his face. _All of them - they’re people who looked at this team, all these sacrifices, and decided it didn’t matter as much as the money, the power, the robo-fucking-pocalypse. I saw the evidence. I saw their choices. We fucked up by letting them join, letting them corrupt it, letting it spread. I started this fucking organization. It’s my responsibility to clean it up._

 

Her eyes flick, for a fraction of a second, to the camera.

 

He sits back. 

***

It’s taking him longer and longer to heal. 

The holes in him are getting bigger and bigger, harder to hide. 

In Mexico, he gets pushed off a building by Sombra and as he falls, he knows she’s going to figure it out. He ghosts and reforms back on the roof, says, _Digo que esta es una victoria,_ but Northman’s trained her too well. 

She stabs him in the heart, up under the ribs. 

He wakes up surrounded by heaters and lamps. 

_I ordered some steaks,_ she says. 

_That won’t be necessary._

_It’s been three hours. Your nanite matrix may be failing._

He sits up. _Estaré bien._

_How long has this been happening?_ He starts turning off the lamps. _If you tell me, I’ll be able to accurately predict the rate of failure, and we can figure out how long we have before you need to get help._

_Help? ¿De quien?_

_From the person who’s been perfecting nanite biotech._

_I’m not going back to Ziegler._

_Then you’ll die. For good._

_Bien._

She frowns at him. _I sent señorita to get more lamps, otherwise she would be slapping you right now._

_You got her to look after you. You’re near enough to being able to look after yourself. You’ve put together this whole Lumerico hit pretty much by yourself. You’ve got half of Los Muertos working for you. I’ve given you everything I know about Talon and Blackwatch and Overwatch._ He stands up. _I’m running out of usefulness, Sombra._

_You’re wrong._ She looks up at him, mouth set. _I need an outfit. I’ve got to strike fear in person._

He almost laughs. _One condition - tell Idaho this was an isolated incident._

_Or what?_

_Or I crawl away to die in peace, and you try dressing yourself._

The steaks arrive via drone, and Northman cooks them while Reaper does preliminary sketches, sitting between a heater and a lamp. 

_Is that meant to be stealth?_ she says, looking at his tablet. 

_She can make herself invisible. The outfit’s meant to be unforgettable._ Northman puts a plate in front of him. _I don’t need this._

She fixes him with a look. _Eat it, cap. Sombra ordered it special._

He eats, and his body pulls it apart before it reaches his stomach. 

***

Jesse McCree puts down a peanut butter sandwich and a glass of water, stares at him.

 

He does need to eat again - but this is bullshit.

 

_Why’d you stop talking to me?_ asks Jesse.

 

_I didn’t trust you not to go off half cocked and get yourself hurt._

 

He tips his hat back. _This one of these do-as-I-say, not-as-I-do things, Reyes?_

 

_McCree, I’ve been legally and biologically dead for years. I know I fucked up._

 

_You might not have if you had read me in, Reyes. Asked for help._

 

_I was trying to protect you._ McCree looks pointedly at his prosthetic. _Yeah, I fucked that up too._

 

McCree shakes his head. _You and Morrison - y’all deserve each other. Pinche ancianos fucking around in masks like no one cares if you’re dead? Like no one else was fucked up by the fall?_

 

He resents the comparison, but can’t deny it. _You give Ana Amari this little lecture?_

 

Jesse grins for the first time. _Fareeha did._

 

He grins back. _Would’ve liked to have seen that._

 

Jesse yawns, looks at the ceiling.

 

_I do wish you would explain to me about Cuba, Reyes. Because I’ve thought back, and that’s the place this all started. What was it that happened in Cuba? ¿Ves alguna ex-novia o qué?_

 

This was always McCree’s interrogation technique - I’m just a dumb friendly cowboy, surely you could school me on some things - Reyes remembers teaching him, _Play to your strengths, hide your intellect._

 

It’s obvious, but at this point, McCree deserves the truth. And at this point, there’s no one it could hurt. 

 

He takes a drink of water. He needs to drink water, again. _Back in the SEP - the original SEP, there were seven of us. We were una maldita unidad, probably. Kim and Russo died in combat. Awray tried to retire, got blown up in the UN bombing. Maginot took disability, got shot at the bombing memorial massacre. Me and Morrison made Overwatch, and look where that got us._

 

_ Parece que eso suma hasta seis, Reyes. _

 

He nods. _Caitlin Northman - Miss Idaho, Awray called her. They were - together. She took Awray’s death hard. Killed the guy who set the bomb. Became a - a vigilante. Trying to track it back. Disappeared for over a decade. She set up that meet, told me, in Cuba, I couldn’t trust Overwatch. I started looking into it, alone, because who could I fucking trust? She found me, after Zurich, put me together, introduced me to Sombra. Worked to get all the people punished who deserved punishment. All the shit out in the open._

 

_¿Dónde está ahora?_

 

Reyes laughs hollowly, because that’s meant to be the disarmingly direct question that unravels the whole story. 

 

_Ella murió._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i'm sorry i'm sorry i'm sorry, new chap tomorrow


	5. accompanied by an unknown woman

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> By the clock Jesse promised him that day was set to the right time, it’s 0236 when he hears the airlock start to hiss.

Sombra makes a debut in Dorado. 

Northman dyes her hair. 

She puts on the clothes he made - graphene silk, conductive gloves she’s programmed, kinetic shoes she can use to grip, to step silent. She smiles. 

***

This is the first time she’s moved openly without Talon, so Reaper’s in Austin stealing patents for them. 

_It’s more important for you to have plausible deniability,_ she had said. _We’ll want your good relationship with Talon a little longer, I think._

If anyone asks, she cut ties with him, she’s gone rogue, she’s more dangerous than ever. 

He sees the news about Portero, hears nothing about anyone getting caught, assumes that it’s gone well, that the plan is on track. 

On November first, he’s in transit - but he is a smoking flame, a symbolic skull - he makes, and hides in his hands, tiny white sugar flowers, sings in his head a Selena song. It’s enough, he thinks. It’ll be enough soon. 

***

When he finds her, in an old office building in Guadalajara, she’s alone, a plate of half eaten potatoes next to her, her new clothes hung neatly, wearing the black knitted sweater, watching a piece of footage over and over, different angles, on six different screens. 

_Watch your back,_ he had told Northman, quietly. _She’s greener than she thinks._

He stands behind her and watches - they’re getting swarmed. Caitlin Northman taking a bullet in the chest for Sombra. Sombra shooting, killing, climbing out of shot. The footage loops again. They’re getting swarmed. 

He starts shutting down the screens. 

_I was ready,_ she says. _We were ready, we were so prepared. They changed their call signs, their frequency at the last minute. They had an AI in there, that they’ve been hiding for -_ She wipes her eyes. _We were prepared._

_Things happen,_ he starts. 

_For a reason?_ She looks up at him, flat. Cold. 

_No. Things happen, and they’re not in your control. No one can control everything. Sometime we can’t even control ourselves._

She drags a screen toward herself, sniffs. _I control me._ She closes the video. _We’re moving up the plan._

***

She eats what he brings her, but doesn’t want to talk about it. 

It takes five more months of intel and wetwork to get them to a place where they can do the next big step: bombing Talon HQ. 

Half of Talon’s higher ups are ex-Blackwatch - Adam DuPlessis, Melisa Scarpolino, Raito Leckie. They haven’t admitted if they recognise him, and why would they? He remembers recruiting them. At the very least this is awkward. 

Reaper has patience, but he also has plastic explosives. 

***

He gets dissipated too, making sure it comes off. 

He wasn’t sure, as the countdown slid away, if he was going to come back. If there was enough of him left. If he had done enough. 

But he reforms slowly, maybe twelve hours later. He limps to the location of their last base - empty, which is clever enough, under the circumstances - he has a link somewhere to the encrypted message box where she keeps the next address - and that’s when he hears the Tesla cannon charge. 

***

By the clock Jesse promised him that day was set to the right time, it’s 0236 when he hears the airlock start to hiss. 

 

No good reason for anyone to be visiting this late, and he can’t summon guns from atoms any more, so he turns on the light and stands in the center of the room. He waits.

 

Jack knocks. 

 

He’s at the inner door, and he knocks.

 

No one has knocked while he’s been here, since the airlock is warning enough. Jack Morrison knocks, instead of rushing in.

 

He can’t open it, from his side, so he just comes up to the door and knocks back, the same knock that means he’s alone. 

 

He’d thought, while he was lying a the bed, sitting in a room, and earlier, while he was staking out a mark, while he was listening to orders, while he was watching people die, about what he might say to Jack, to Jesse, to Fareeha, to Amari. To Shimada, to Winston, to Wilhelm, to Lindholm. What justification, what accusation, what confession. 

 

None of these planned conversations have actually worked out. He hadn’t really expected them to. 

 

He still has some ideas about what, maybe, a conversation with Jack might involve - punching probably. 

 

But Jack Morrison opens the door wearing a t-shirt and a tactical visor and the first thing out of Reyes’ mouth is, _You wear that everywhere?_

 

Jack stands on the threshold, awkward. _It’s useful for night vision._

 

He came here in the dark, but he knocked, and he wears no visible weapons, so he’s probably not here to kill him. _Take it off, Jack._

 

His hands twitch - the memory of obedience. _Not everyone here knows who I was._

 

_There’s a camera blind spot in the corner, if you’re so concerned. Take it off._

 

He sighs, steps into the room, pulls it off. 

 

There are deep, long scars across his face. He’s old, maybe older than the years should have made him. Bright blue eyes, skin crinkled around them. Everything golden about him has gone pale. 

 

Still pretty.

 

_You meant to be here? Strike Commander?_

 

_I’m just a soldier now._

 

_Right. Just a soldier, sneaking into a cell, in the middle of the night, in a fucking mask, for some perfectly legitimate reason._

 

 _In Egypt - last year._ He swallows. _You shot me in the back._

 

_Yeah, right in the body armour. If everyone I shot wants to come in and get an explanation, we could probably figure out a time that’s not 02 goddamn 30._

 

 _You said you’d been looking for me._ Reyes remembers that lie, that bitter little needle. _Were you going to kill me? If Ana wasn’t there?_

 

He sighs. _I don’t know._

 

 _You don’t know?_ Jack raises his eyebrows.

 

_In Zurich, before we got blown to shit - were you gonna kill me? You had a weapon pointed at me, same as in Egypt._

 

Morrison pinches the bridge of his nose, like an old man. _I don’t know._

 

_Well, then._

 

Jack stares at him, wide eyed, looking almost - scared. _I’m sorry._

 

That is - not as satisfying as Reyes had thought it would be. _What?_

 

_I’m sorry I didn’t listen to you. I’m sorry I failed to notice how badly I had fucked up. I’m sorry I accused you of - everything._

 

_I did do a lot of it - killed a lot of people since._

 

Jack nods. _The UN lied to me._

 

_They do that._

 

_You didn’t blow up the HQ._

 

_No._

 

_Both our organisations were infiltrated by Talon._

 

_Uh-huh._

 

_You did shoot me in the back in Egypt, though._

 

_Yes._

 

_I might have killed you, you might have killed me._

 

Reyes shrugs. _Let’s not find out._

 

Jack stares at him a moment, and smiles, just a little. _You know I missed our conversations?_ He looks at the visor, at his hands, says, quietly, _I missed you. Mourned you._

 

Reyes breathes out, slowly. _Yeah,_ he says. _We fucked up pretty good, huh?_

 

The airlock hisses again. _Shoulda taken advantage of that blindspot,_ Jack says.

 

 _Next time,_ Reyes says, _how about you come during the day? Make this look less suspicious._

 

 _Won’t be a next time._

 

Reyes frowns. If he’s over-estimated Jack’s mental health, and this has been a ploy to get some kind of closure before somehow finally fucking murdering him, or himself, he’s gonna be pretty mad at Santa Muerte for not warning him - but she’s always warned him against Jack. 

 

Everything always warned him against Jack. 

 

 _Morrison!_ yells Winston from the other side of the door. _If you’ve compromised our security to execute one of your retribution fantasies I will personally break -_ The door swings open. Winston has his Tesla cannon levelled at Morrison. 

 

 _Oh,_ says Reyes. _So you really weren’t meant to be here._

 

 _Sorry,_ says Morrison. That’s kind of satisfying, for some reason. Winston pulls his weapon up, stares between them.

 

 _Are the two of you colluding now?_ he growls.

 

 _I haven’t colluded with anyone in years,_ says Jack, almost wistful. Winston’s forehead creases.

 

Reyes puts his face in his hands. _Get out, Jack._

 

 _Precisely what I was going to say,_ enunciates Winston, gesturing with the cannon. Morrison sidles out, stands behind Winston, putting his mask back on.

 

 _Fixed your glasses,_ says Reyes. _Looks good._

 

 _I will talk to you at a reasonable hour,_ rumbles Winston, _when I have finished with your erstwhile co-commander._ He begins to swing the door shut, addresses Jack. _Or whatever else you were._

 

Fuck, thinks Reyes, for a split second, before he remembers that it doesn’t matter at all. 

 

Whether or not he and Jack ever engaged in intimate collusion is extremely low on the list of things that anyone is remotely worried about. 

 

Fuck, he thinks again, for different reasons.

 

***

 

Winston comes in at 1330, with a lunch tray and a file. He’s been in here, as far as he knows, four days. 

 

 _Gabriel Reyes,_ he says, flipping open the file. _Officially, we’ve kept you here on a medical watch, in case your nanite matrix suffers catastrophic collapse. Unofficially - we’d like you to work with us again._

 

_But it would be unethical to threaten me with indefinite incarceration,_ says Reyes, around a mouthful. This is - tempeh? Tofu? He's been dreaming about the shrimp po' boys he and Banda and McCree had once eaten in Singapore. 

 

_Quite. It would be equally unethical to suggest that once you are discharged from our care, that you would be the target of a great number of rather angry Talon operatives._

 

_You gonna broadcast the location of your base just to burn me? Doubt it._

 

Winston rolls his lips back, for a moment, then sighs. _We have no authority to keep you here. We have no authority at all._ He lowers his glasses. _And there are very many people, here and elsewhere, who have reason to be angry with you. But - Overwatch was never about making enemies. It was about banding together to help and protect everyone who needed it._

 

 _I remember,_ says Reyes.

 

 _You are being released from your medical watch today, Reyes. At the end of this conversation. You can go wherever you want. Do what you want. But I ask you, as a fellow agent. As someone who understands better than anyone what is at stake. Will you stay?_

 

He takes a breath, and the airlock hisses. Winston frowns, glances over. 

 

_It must be an emergency, I told Athena to -_

 

It’s Amari opening the inner door. _Morrison is missing._

 

_What?_

 

 _He left the base without reporting and his beacon has gone off grid. It was masked, but Athena rebooted, and he’s been unaccounted for eight hours._

 

Winston looks at Reyes.

 

_I didn’t do shit - Jack walked in here in the middle of the night and apologised, and then you turned up._

 

_Yes, I reviewed the footage, but this is - how did he do this?_

 

Reyes raises his eyebrows. 

 

***

 

So Reyes is released, and immediately finds himself back in an Overwatch situation room, tracking down Jack Morrison. 

 

This is some mirrorverse shit. 

 

McCree doesn’t know. Neither Amari knows. Song, who’s new, has no idea. 

 

_He’s left his effects, so either he plans to come back or he plans to die._

 

 _What effects?_ Reyes asks.

 

 _Photos. Indiana. Us,_ says Amari. 

 

 _He planned to die before?_

 

 _Not in so many words,_ says Fareeha, _but yes._

 

They’re looking at the last footage of Morrison - between him leaving Reyes’ airlock and leaving the facility - and the Jack Morrison on the screen reads something on his comm.

 

_We know what he got sent?_

 

Winston asks Athena, and she admits that she cannot see. There are several more invisible messages Jack received, back to some hours before he visited Reyes.

 

_That’s how Sombra works - could be she’s looking for new recruits, since I’ve been in a Tesla cage._

 

 _How do we find her?_ Winston raises his paws, ready to type a command.

 

_You don’t. She’s smarter than that._

 

_You’re saying that the collective knowledge of Overwatch can’t find one young woman you worked with for years?_

 

 _Yeah,_ he says. _You only caught me because she wanted you to._

 

 _What was her last known base?_ asks Amari.

 

_Where you picked me up - I could give you a list of other locations, but that’s more ticking off where she won’t be._

 

_Why would Jack be working for her? I thought he was angry about - well, us offering you a place, but he - somehow - accessed all the interviews, and your cell, and then you two came to - an accord, didn’t you?_

 

_He also said this won’t happen again - could have been a man looking for a suicide mission._

 

 _Um, guys?_ says Song, looking at a tablet. _Found him._

 

She taps it up onto the big screen and it’s - Jack chingado Morrison, mask off, speaking directly into the camera. _... the corruption, the failures, the crimes, of the UN, of various criminal agencies, of my own agency, that I failed to prevent. The Sombra Collective have released information about the history of Overwatch that explains everything, and I say with all honesty: it is the truth._

 

A suicide mission, of a kind. Being the face that speaks to power. Even a face like Jack Morrison’s.

 

 _When was this released?_ asks Winston.

 

 _Ninety seconds ago?_ Song tabs through pages. _Along with like, a million megs of data? It is all over the net. Every channel._

 

Reyes feels a little hollow, now that it’s done. It’s done, and he may never see Sombra again.

 

 _I am receiving a message,_ says Athena.

 

 _Hey,_ says Sombra, too close to the mike. _Morrison says you guys will let us take refuge there. Let me know if you’re going to shoot me on sight, and I’ll go somewhere else. Save me a death, save you the holy hell that will be unleashed on all networked systems if anyone ever hurts me._

 

Reyes looks at Winston, whose mouth is gaping. _You want her on your side, and not anyone else's._

 

_Señor? You sound alive. Excellent._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> election looks fucked, hey? stay safe.


	6. like that new-made Tomorrow

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The chopper lands and Sombra leaps out like a fucking circus act.

She hacks a helicopter, so there’s no flight manifest, and the first hint Reyes gets is the three heat signatures. 

 

 _There’s a third with them,_ he says, and Amari confirms. 

 

_Anyone else she could have brought in?_

 

Widowmaker, maybe, because Sombra has something like a crush on her, and has been looking into undoing the brainwashing. But that would be a stupid guest to bring to your new refuge, if she wants good will and not getting shot.

 

Everybody has weapons, though no one’s drawn them. The chopper lands and Sombra leaps out like a fucking circus act.

 

_Hola amigos!_

 

Amari side eyes him for a second, but he approaches her. _Good job._

 

 _I know!_ She pokes him in the nose. _Looks like you’re a real boy again. You’re welcome._

 

 _I meant using Morrison -_

 

He looks over her shoulder to where Morrison’s getting out of the chopper - but - Caitlin Northman is too.

 

They both come to Sombra and Reyes. 

 

 _You were dead._ He hadn’t realised he could be shocked anymore.

 

_Didn’t take._

 

He shakes his head, like he’s shaking off water. _It’s been six fucking months!_

 

 _Is it not funny when I do it?_ Northman raises her eyebrows.

 

 _You!_ he turns to Sombra.

 

 _To be fair, I never lied to you,_ Sombra says. _I manipulated some footage, and faked some tears, and you read into it._

 

He looks at Morrison, and Northman, and back to Sombra. _Was this part of your plan? Fake her death to make me vulnerable, get me in here, so Jack would come find you? So you’d have the whitest, most well known face preaching for you?_

 

Sombra laughs. _No. I got you in here so they’d fix your nanites. I didn’t need Jack Morrison, he was just icing sugar._

 

 _I’ve been called worse,_ Jack says. 

 

 _Miss Sombra?_ says Winston. _I believe you were interested in refuge?_

 

 _Oh, maybe for a little while._ She flips her hair, leans sideways. _Is that D.Va? I loved her last single._

 

***

 

They all cram together for a weird, complicated debrief where Sombra keeps interrupting people and Jack sits next to Northman, both of them across from Reyes, looking like a ghost dream date.

 

Sombra explains how they conned Talon.

 

Northman explains, briefly, her partnership with Sombra. 

 

Morrison explains how he was suspicious of Reaper, but someone sent him instructions as to how to hack the video files of his holding cell, and a request to report back.

 

 _I did not tell him to break in, by the way. That was his idea,_ says Sombra.

 

 _Why?_ asks Winston, longsufferingly. 

 

 _I was curious,_ says Jack. _And no one would talk to me_.

 

 _Because you’ve been acting unpredictably and irrationally,_ replies Amari, _particularly about Reyes._

 

Jack glances at Reyes, looks at his hands. _Yeah. Sorry._

 

Sombra says, _I knew he was precisely the kind of disgruntled I work very well with, and wanted to check that señor had made a recovery. And then he wanted to know more, so I thought I may as well make good use of his face._

 

 _Figured I should finish what we started,_ Jack says, still looking down.

 

***

 

They break for dinner. Sombra announces she’ll stay the night.

 

 _How gracious of you,_ says Winston, but he’s smiling.

 

***

 

The whole future, twenty or thirty years, stretches ahead of him. There’s work to do, people that need help, and Reyes is standing in the common room, watching the news unfold on three screens, trying to figure out where the fuck to start, when Northman nudges him in the arm with a jumpdrive.

 

_What?_

 

She shoves it into his hand. _Don’t waste time._

 

_Idaho, what the fuck -_

 

_Star Trek. Sigue, cap._

 

He looks at her - grey blonde hair growing out, scarred, tired, more familiar than his own face, by now. She puts one hand on his shoulder, and with the other, slaps him upside the head, not gently.

 

 _Ms Northman, you’re my favourite goddamn person,_ says McCree from the couch. 

 

 _If this goes bad, you can explain it to Sombra,_ he tells her. 

 

 _Fuck off, cap._ She walks away from him, and McCree makes room for her on the couch.

 

***

 

He has to ask Athena where Morrison’s room is, and Athena makes a big deal out of welcoming him back, and some of the new recruits edge past him, and the whole thing is fucking - he’s been out of normal social situations for so long it feels like a foreign country, but worse, because everything looks familiar.

 

Luckily, Jack’s also pretty bad at normal human interactions.

 

Reyes knocks, and Jack Morrison opens the door, stares at him like he’s a holy vision.

 

 _Wanna -_ he holds up the drive, clears his throat - _wanna watch Star Trek?_

 

Jack shakes his head, and Reyes is ready to leave - this hallway, this facility, this goddamn continent - but Jack reaches up, catches Reyes’ face, pulls him in and kisses him. 

 

Reyes stumbles forward, drops the drive, wraps his arms around Jack, feels the heat and weight of him, finds his wet mouth, his soft hair, his hands, holding Reyes.

 

They stagger, together, a little into the room, and Reyes pushes him against the wall, leans back, looks at him - Jack Morrison, fifty-one, scarred skin flushed, blue eyes blown, lips parted, thinks, _they don’t love you like I love you._

 

Outloud, he says, _Slow down,_ and runs his fingers along Jack’s cheek. _Dumbass. Haven’t even closed the door._

 

 _I don’t care,_ mutters Jack. He presses his hand to Reyes’, over his own chest. _Gabriel. I missed you. I hated you, and even then, I wanted you. I always wanted you._

 

Reyes kicks the door shut, feeling drunk and stupid and horny - alive. 

 

 _Yeah,_ he says, coming close again. _I had that._

 

He opens his arms to Jack, who buries his face in Reyes’ neck, fingers digging into his shoulderblades. Reyes kisses his head, near the ear, looks around the room for the first time - the bed’s been stripped, shelves emptied. 

 

There’s a bag on the floor, not yet zipped.

 

_Where you going?_

 

Morrison sighs against his skin. _Indiana. Gotta explain things to my mom._

 

_Your mom the sheriff? She thought you were dead?_

 

 _She’ll probably kill me herself._ That’s my job, thinks Reyes, and holds him tighter, feels the rise and fall of his ribcage, the quick beat of his heart, so close. _Come with me._

 

 _To Indiana? Meet your mother?_ Jack raises his head, nods. _She’ll fucking murder me._

 

_She’s a good person. Better than me._

 

Reyes huffs, kisses him on the mouth. _Only if we can make a stop in Cali. I got stuff to pick up. If it even still exists._

 

 _Your guitar? And the lockbox?_ Jack tilts them towards the bed. _I put them in a vault._

 

 _How did you -_ Reyes stares at him. _The San Andreas Watchpoint heist was to get my stuff? You -_

 

Morrison looks awkward. There was a point to the facemask, after all. Still has no idea how to school his reactions. _Didn’t want it to become evidence. I didn’t open the box, or anything._

 

Reyes presses their foreheads together, desperately. _McCree said we deserve each other. Didn’t know how right he was._ He steps backwards, pulls Jack closer to the bed, towing him by the hips. _You creepy motherfucker._

 

 _Pot, kettle, everything you own is black,_ Jack smiles, helplessly, hands sliding around Reyes’ waist. 

 

 _That’s what I’m saying,_ Reyes peels off his shirt, then Jack’s. They’re both covered in hypertrophic and atrophic scars, holes and hooks and messy asterixes where the skin has survived, some of which he remembers, some of which are lost. _We’re a matched fucking set. No one else would have us._

 

 _Good,_ says Jack, and shoves him onto the bare bed. Reyes drags him along too.

 

They are too old and out of practice and excited to do anything more than roll their hips together, really. 

 

Jack curls down, opens his pants, blows him a little while, which is good, it’s great, but Reyes drags him up to kiss, folds over and swallows Jack’s dick, too, and Jack bucks, rolls them off the bed, tangled and still hard. 

 

They finish the way they did the first time, thirty fucking years ago - sweaty, frantic, on the floor, not thinking about the future.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i was gonna keep up my posting schedule but i got sad so here's a happy ending


	7. the charge is clear: one is condemned to life not death.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> No reason for Jack Morrison, former Strike Commander of Overwatch, dead man and snitch, to be travelling with a guitar.

They wear hats and sunglasses, grow out their beards, but what really throws people is the guitar. 

 

No reason for Jack Morrison, former Strike Commander of Overwatch, dead man and snitch, to be travelling with a guitar. 

 

No reason for him to be travelling with a brown man, carrying a brown man’s luggage. 

 

No reason for them to spend hours in the car, in cafes, at tourist traps, talking and listening and arguing and summarising where they fucked up, and how. 

 

No reason for them to be throwing down in truckstop parking lots after sundown - not violently, just getting exercise. 

 

No reason for Jack Morrison to be fucking, getting fucked, in shitty motel rooms through Colorado and Kansas. That wouldn’t make any sense.

 

***

 

He wakes up hungry, thirsty, too hot, too cold. Wakes up needing to piss because Jack’s knee is pressing against his bladder. 

 

He hadn’t thought he missed this - and eating shitty vending machine cronuts because everything else is closed is probably something he doesn’t need to repeat - but he wakes up, and keeps waking up, his body wants to wake up, wants to eat and fuck and go back to sleep. 

 

He explains this to Jack, once.

 

 _Do you,_ he frowns, _not want to?_

 

 _No, I want to. I just - I spent so long ignoring things, and now I can’t._ He slides his hand along Jack’s arm. _I feel like I can’t ignore anything I want._

 

 _Oh no,_ says Jack, tilting his head so his mouth is closer to Reyes’. _That’s just - too bad. Is there anything in particular that you want right now? I don’t know if I’ll be able to help, but you just tell me, and we’ll see._ He blinks very slowly - still pretty with a silver beard and scars, still pretty with Reyes knowing they’re probably going to keep doing this until one of them is dead.

 

 _Want you to shut up,_ says Reyes, closing the gap.

 

***

 

Sombra had given him a phone, and sends him updates on the conspiracy theories about them - they’ve been photographed together once, on this trip, in the background of someone’s selfie, which she kindly erases for them. 

 

 _eras sólo bueno en sigilo cuando podrías sublimar_ she writes.

 

 _Soy muy bueno en sigilo, me distraje momentáneamente. Además, puedo sublimar de nuevo,_ he replies, with a video of his arm dissolving and reforming.

 

_ probablemente es una cosa buena que nunca me dejaste reclutar a Morrison, si es una distracción _

 

He sends her a video of his hand reforming to flip her off.

 

***

 

They get all the way to Bloomington before anyone recognises him. 

 

 _Jack Morrison,_ says an old woman in line at the gas station. _You damn fool, putting your mother through that grief._

 

Jack turns, very slowly. _How’ve you been, Maria?_

 

_Fine, particularly since none of my sons played dead._

 

Jack doesn’t even wince. He catches Reyes by the elbow, pulls him close. _This is my partner, Gabriel._

 

_Un buen nombre. You know this man is a damn fool, Gabriel?_

 

 _Ma’am, I know it,_ he smiles.

 

_ Por supuesto que sí. Apuesto que estabas furioso porque él también lo hizo. _

 

_ Eso sería diciendo poco. _

 

Jack shoves cash at the teller.

 

***

 

It’s night by the time they get to the house where Jack’s mother lives. He goes in by himself, first, while Reyes sits on the hood of the car and looks at the moon.

 

Sombra’s been sending him her new five year plan. He wonders if Winston knows how much of Overwatch’s resources she’s incorporating. He wonders who he wants to work with, if he wants to work with anyone. He wonders if he’s done right.

 

An owl - barred white and brown - sweeps silently across the yard, lands on the edge of the roof. 

 

He looks up at it, head tilted. 

 

The owl trills once, twice, bobs. 

 

That’s almost a nod, he figures. 

 

He’ll take it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> as i said to thundara, who kindly beta read this: if we can't have happy endings in fiction, where will we get them?
> 
> this is a character i saw being frequently represented as either mysterious and unknowable or without agency, subject to the whims of higher powers. i set out to write a narrative that gave him a voice? that gave him choices? i mean, he spends most of this story in a cell or being ordered around by a teen, but at least i tried.
> 
> the title and chapter titles are from Anne Carson's "Fragment of Ibykos Translated Six Ways" - it's a transformative poem and all the quotes are re-contextualised by the narrative - which felt like a good analogy for both what happens in the story (reyes re-invents himself several times) and what i was trying to do with the story (gabriel reyes did nothing wrong squad 5eva)
> 
> let me know if you wanna talk about any of the stuff in this story.
> 
> thanks to valcries for helping with the spanish! and to liripip for the art!

**Author's Note:**

> also, for the record: i predicted sjw sombra, and had that nose poke in my original notes. hire me blizzard, i'm a goddamn psychic.


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